


Morning Fog

by Raven_Ehtar



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: First Time, FrostIron - Freeform, M/M, Morning After, flirty loki, hungover Tony
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 18:53:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13254537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raven_Ehtar/pseuds/Raven_Ehtar
Summary: Tony's used to waking up with a hangover. He's used to waking up next to people he doesn't really remember from the night before. Waking up next to a supervillain is a bit different.





	Morning Fog

**Author's Note:**

> I was actually writing this when I got the prompt to write _What the Cat Dragged Home_. I got a laugh out of writing two drunk Frostiron fics at the same time. Enjoy.

Tony woke up to the not unfamiliar sensation of a hangover. 

It was a common enough occurrence that he began running his hazy awareness over himself before he was even fully awake, assessing the damage. First on the list of things to check was to be certain all of the appropriate limbs were attached in the appropriate places. Without taking the risk of actually moving, that much at least seemed to be in order. One head, two arms, two legs, digits of various sorts at the furthest ends where needed. Good. No outlandish bodily injury had taken place, then. 

Next came a more detailed check of those same limbs and his torso, searching for anything that was in severe and/or suspicious amounts of pain. He’d been lucky to have only come home once with a rather embarrassing tattoo on an even more embarrassing bit of anatomy, and after the long, drawn out process required to remove it, he was always quick to check for that particular pain anywhere on his person when he woke with an uncertain memory of the night before. 

No telltale burns of a recent needle, but it did feel a bit as though he had been through a tumble dryer. That wasn’t as uncommon as he would like, these days. What with dressing up in a high tech tin can and throwing himself in front of all sorts of people who were all too willing to beat him against the local architecture, it was a rare morning when he _didn’t_ wake up sore and bruised. The quality of these aches was quite sharp and fresh, suggesting that Tony had come by all of them the day before. Which would make sense, as there had been trouble brewing for over a week amongst the neighborhood ne’er do wells. A physical throw down was well within the realm of possibility. In fact the longer he thought about it, the more bits and pieces of his memory started coming back to him. 

Most of it was a disjointed, garbled mess, but enough to get a general idea of a battle being fought: flashes of his HUD, JARVIS calmly stating in his ear various bits of damage his suit was taking, the odd pressure that came from craftless flight being abruptly traded for weightlessness as he was batted out of the air and into something which was nearly – but not quite – as sturdy as he was. He couldn’t recall any real details of the battle, but he was alive and in his own bed, so he felt safe assuming he’d won. How much collateral damage was done he would rely on newsfeeds to tell him. Whether or not he’d actually brought down whoever his opponent had been would probably be related to him by erstwhile teammates. Especially if the answer was ‘no.’

So. A day of fighting followed by an evening of heavy drinking. Pretty straightforward as these things went, no permanent or semi-permanent damage done to his person, and a small mystery as to the specifics to figure out today. That was fine. That was manageable. 

Preliminary scan on his own systems complete, Tony was just beginning to make a go of stretching out his sore limbs one by one when there was a shift of weight on the mattress and the unmistakable sound of someone behind him beginning to wake. 

_Ah._ It had been that kind of night. Fighting, drinking, and then fun. Or at least he was assuming ‘fun.’ His memory was stubbornly refusing any of his attempts to recall _that_ part of the evening. 

Of course. Of course it would do its best and give him flashes of the painful parts, but when it came to the pleasure bit afterwards it was silent. Typical. 

Moving carefully to avoid disturbing his mystery bedmate – and to baby some _very_ sore limbs, _ow_ – Tony twisted around to look behind him. 

The first thing that met his gaze was a tangled mess of shiny, black hair, more than shoulder length and thick. His bedmate was turned away from him – for which he was grateful, as it bypassed the awkward process of untangling limbs – but which also meant there was no hint of a face to jog his memory. There was an exposed shoulder, though, well-muscled and pale, and an expanse of equally pale neck where the dark hair parted and pooled to either side. Well, pale save for the dark and terribly obvious hickey left right at the join between neck and shoulder. Tony started at it for a minute, but looking did nothing to revive any memories of having put it there. From what little else he could make out of the form beneath the blankets, his bedmate for the night was tall and relatively slender. There was a pronounced dip in the blankets at the hips that suggested a narrow waist, though not much else to indicate an abundance of curves. Of course, it was a little difficult to tell from the back, and when straining to turn far enough to see. 

Well. It had been some time since he’d been faced with this particular set up, but he was sure he could remember all the steps to a reasonably graceful exit. He’d been fairly responsible over the last few years. Or, if not _responsible_ , then far too busy being reckless in completely other ways to need to worry about morning after awkwardness. The skills would doubtless be a little rusty at this point, but it was bound to be like riding a bike, wasn’t it? Pedal fast enough and sheer momentum would see him clear of most obstacles. Physics would have a chance to catch up and crash on him once he stopped, long after his guest was gone and he wouldn’t have to deal with face to face fall out. 

Only issue was he didn’t have a handy Pepper to do the actual shooing out of his bed buddy. He’d have to handle that himself, and that was always awkward. It’d only be worse than usual this time, being out of practice and having zero memory of the night before. Paying for a cab was a given, or offering one of his own drivers, but did he offer his shower as well? Food? Tony had a vague idea that Pepper laundered the clothes that were left strewn around, but little shifts and changes in his mystery partner’s breathing told him he wouldn’t have the time for that. He just hoped there wouldn’t be any expectations for conversation. That was more than he was willing to struggle through, all things considered. 

As the body beside him slowly came to life, Tony levered himself into a halfway sitting position. Ideally he would be showered, dressed and in a different room when the other finally blinked awake, relaying offers of cabs via screen and speaker, but one couldn’t always have everything, could they?

He could tell the moment hazy half wakefulness became full consciousness. The small movements of stretching and curling ceased abruptly, and the shape beneath the blankets went incredibly still, as though holding its breath. Probably was, at that, waking up in a strange bed. Opulent, but strange all the same. 

“So, I don’t know how good _your_ memory is of last night,” he said as casually as possible, “but I’m willing to categorize it as ‘good’ unless and until it proves to have been otherwise.”

At Tony’s voice the figure became, if anything, even more rigid than before. There was the soft sound of a sharp inhalation, but nothing else seemed to be forthcoming. 

Tony began to worry, having to fight down the urge to either fidget where he sat or spring up out of the bed and flee. He was an adult, damn it, and this was far from the first time he had been in this particular position. 

“Of course if you know me at all, you know that this sort of thing isn’t all that unusual for me; almost routine, really. I don’t really go in for the long term, or even the mid-term, really. But short term could include breakfast and a shower before you head back to whatever sort of normal life you have.” He was rambling and he knew it. Unfortunately the awareness didn’t seem to be doing a thing in getting him to stop. “I have no idea what’s in the kitchen right now, but I’m sure there’s enough to feed a football team if you’re hungry. I’d offer to cook it myself, but I promised someone I would make no more culinary efforts in interest of public health standards. Cereal is usually safe, and toast. Anything more than that and apparently I’m as trustworthy as my idiot ‘bots. Though at least with me you get a charming smile--“

An impatient huff finally got Tony’s mouth to shut. It immediately dropped open again when his bed partner spoke. Even slurred and heavy with residual sleep, there was no mistaking it. “Truly, your level of sobriety has no discernable effect on how much you talk.”

Tony watched in frozen, horrified fascination as the figure beside him shifted and levered itself into a sitting position. Blankets fell away to reveal a smooth, muscled and very masculine chest and belly. Black hair parted, and Tony was looking into an angular face, mouth pursed into a small frown, dark brows close over a pair of toxically green eyes. 

“Oh, you have _got_ to be kidding me.” Tony groaned, dropping his head into his hands. 

“Rude.”

He looked up again, startled by the very human response. It was still Loki who was staring at him, Loki who was _sharing his bed_ and who was, so far as Tony could tell without twitching back the covers, completely nude and looking far too comfortable about it. Especially considering how close they were sitting. Tony felt a ridiculous urge to pull up the blankets to cover as much of himself as he could. It was an urge he stubbornly resisted. 

Loki’s expression wasn’t exactly _friendly_ , but neither was it murderous. Tony was grateful for that much, at least. Death by naked Loki while still lying in bed would be too humiliating. 

“If this is how you normally converse with guests in your bed, then I have no difficulty believing that you don’t ‘go in for the long term.’” Loki shifted, long limbs beneath the covers rearranging themselves to a more comfortable position, the man leaning back against the headboard, the very picture of ease. He looked Tony over searchingly, appraisingly, and he had to stamp down another urge to hide from that gaze. “May I take it, then, that you have no memory of last night?”

 _Not for lack of trying,_ Tony thought frantically, pushing at the edges of where his memories cut off, hoping desperately that more would reveal itself, that recollections would unfold and he might be given some understanding of _how_ he’d wound up in bed with a supervillain. 

Though to be fair, ‘supervillain’ didn’t really describe Loki anymore. He’d gotten up to plenty of trouble since his spectacular debut in New York, but nothing had ever really been on that same scale. In the last few months there had been hints that the bad boy Prince was actually attempting to reconcile with his brother. In the most roundabout and prickly way imaginable, because of course Loki could never be simple or easy. But still, the attempt was being made. Thor was thrilled and ready to take any olive branch offered, though not being quite so trusting as to accept the overtures at face value. For which the rest of the team was extremely grateful. The rest of the team’s willingness to believe Loki’s tentative change of heart varied, with Clint being on one extreme end, the opposite of Thor. Tony had been somewhere in the middle, too familiar with the process of redemption to dismiss him out of hand, but also too familiar with betrayal to trust without some sort of assurance. 

None of which lent itself very easily to the two of them sharing Tony’s bed. He tried to think of some sort of outlandish but innocuous reason why they might have ended up here, but it was a losing battle. Tony knew he was nude, Loki looked much the same, and there was other evidence his damnably efficient brain couldn’t help but tally up for him. Tousled hair on Loki, which, he couldn’t help but notice with a little charmed twinge, attempted to curl when it wasn’t slicked back. A certain rawness about his mouth which had Tony’s imagination sparking in _extremely_ unhelpful ways. Little marks along his pale torso which could be scratches, finger bruises or suck marks… though that could all be the aftermath of battles. Probably not, though. Especially when taken with the rather impressive collection of marks at Loki’s throat and collar. It was a little difficult to think of any innocuous reason for those.

He was also becoming aware, in waves, that not _all_ of the soreness he was feeling was likely to have come from a battle in one of his suits. One or two in particular were very specific and unlikely to come from anything other than a more intimate kind of tumble. 

“There are gaps,” he hedged, not willing to admit just how much fog filled his brain. “Gaps I’m quickly filling in with the available evidence. Though I’m still a little hazy on one or two points.”

“I should imagine so.” Loki stretched one leg beneath the covers. Tony did his best to ignore how near it was to his own and keep his eyes firmly above waist height. “You were remarkably drunk when I arrived to confer with you, though I must admit it took me some minutes to deduce just _how_ drunk. You must have had much practice to pull off the illusion of sobriety so well.” He raised a brow at him, not so much a question as a commentary. 

Tony knew Loki had enough background on all of the Avengers team to know his history prior to Afghanistan, the carousing and whatnot. And after as well, come to that. He would just get shitfaced for much less playful reasons after his lovely three month stay in a cave. Not that it had ever really been for happy reasons. Loki would know all that, and able to deduce whatever wasn’t immediately obvious. Having it confirmed wouldn’t change anything. 

With that in mind, Tony shrugged. “One of my many skills. So what exactly did you want to ‘confer’ with me about? And how worried should I be that you might decide to kill me in the next few minutes?” He was fairly certain Loki _wouldn’t_ kill him any time soon, but the situation was too strange. Accepting it as normal even by the exclusion of such a question felt like another, huge step into the insane landscape his life had become, and he just wasn’t ready to take that big of a step yet. 

Both brows rose at the question, a hint of a smile playing at the corner of the Asgardian’s mouth. “Considering that I have not already done so - one way or another,” he added, running a green gaze slowly over Tony, “I believe you are safe for now.”

His skin went hot under the stare - oh, god, was he _blushing_ now? - and he clamped down very hard on the inclination to squirm. He was caught between two opposite but equally intense desires to either disappear entirely from the face of the Earth, or to _remember_ what the hell he and Loki had gotten up to. Loki was far from bad looking… and the longer they sat together the harder it became to ignore the heat coming off of him, to not look over the lean muscle and pale skin… As it was he kept having to haul his eyes away from Loki’s necklace of bruises.

‘Safe for now.’ Right. For a given value of ‘safe,’ let alone any clear definition. Tony was feeling anything but safe just now. 

“As for what I wished to speak with you about…” He shrugged, one shoulder rising and falling, muscle moving liquidly beneath pale skin. “I merely wished your opinion on a mechanical matter, as that is your area of expertise.”

Tony blinked. “Wait, you came to me for a consult on computers? I thought you Asgardians were all so far ahead of us technologically that we ‘might as well still be tossing rocks at each other.’”

Loki’s lips quirked. “Yes, well. I may have been a bit hasty in that description. Your people are not so primitive as you once were, and you in particular more advanced than could reasonably be expected.”

“Thanks. I think… I’m flattered.”

“All things considered, you ought to be.” He looked pointedly at the blankets in Tony’s lap.

Yeah, that was definitely a blush. Dammit. 

Tony straightened so he was sitting up, trying to feel a little more in control and less like he was on the defensive. It wasn’t an uncommon feeling with Loki, but not in his own bed, damn it. “Flattered, huh?” He ignored how their legs brushed together when he shifted. “See, I’m wondering about that. I’m wondering just how ‘flattered’ I ought to be as opposed to, say, ‘appalled.’ Maybe even ‘horrified.’”

Loki stiffened perceptibly. A certain softness in his face, a small smile playing about his lips, which Tony hadn’t even realized was there disappeared in a blink. His expression became stony, the green of his eyes nearly reptilian. “And why should you feel horrified, Stark?” He asked the question very quietly. 

Tony wasn’t stupid, current circumstances notwithstanding. He realized he’d just brushed against a landmine, one which could easily go off if he wasn’t careful. He plunged on, hoping momentum would carry him over to the safe side before he found all of his limbs made strangers to his torso. “Well, I mean. Waking up in bed next to a pretty face is all well and good, but as you so kindly pointed out, I was very drunk last night. I’m still having trouble recalling details--“ details such as _anything_ that involved Loki “--which suggests a level of drunkenness impressive even for me. And it was while I was in such a state that we, uh, ended up here. Am I to understand that you took advantage of me in my weakened state? Have you besmirched my honor, knave?”

Loki blinked at him. The stoniness had fallen away a little, leaving him blank. He looked a little nonplussed, to be honest, staring at Tony for several seconds without moving, just examining Tony’s face as though searching for some clue, some trace of taunting or mockery in his expression. “Perhaps,” he said eventually, his tone carefully flat. “Though given your reputation I would question just how much _I_ could do that has not already been done. However, drunk or not, it was not I who initiated our little interaction.”

Tony stifled his groan as best he could, but still winced. “Come on strong, did I?”

“That’s one way of putting it. It was your rather determined enthusiasm which eventually overcame my reticence.”

This time Tony did groan. Yeah, that sounded like him, alright. No one could say that he was shy even at the best of times. When under the influence he was an outright harlot, his money and pedigree the only things keeping that exact wording from being used in print. It was still a close call at times. Still, this was a first, even for him. To attempt - and apparently succeed in - seducing an alien and most-of-the-time enemy. It was also the first time he’d gone to bed with someone after they’d thrown him out a window, now he came to think about it. He’d have thought that would have happened sooner. But the getting drunk and dragging someone into a bedroom? Yeah, he’d done that before. 

“I may swear off of booze for the rest of my life,” he muttered into his hands.

“Mm. I may hold you to that, Anthony.”

“I’ll bet,” he muttered, not raising his head. He could just see Loki checking on his sobriety via Thor or someone else, spying on him with magic, anything to avoid a repeat of last night. Then his brain caught up with what Loki had actually said. _“’Anthony’?”_

Loki was smirking at him in a way which only served to remind him that they were both naked and sitting very near to each other - a fact which he hadn’t exactly _forgotten._ He also noticed for the first time that rather distinctive bite mark on one side of Loki’s throat, nice and dark. Tony stared at it, wondering. It looked as though it had hurt. What exactly had been happening when he’d left it?

“I would see more of you sober, Anthony Stark,” he said, drawing Tony’s attention back to his face. “Impressive as your ability to function while drunk is, I doubt it is the last of your skills. Nor would I wish to think that such an evening as we had was made possible purely due to your own fogged senses.”

Tony frowned, trying to keep up. He must still be partially asleep, or partially drunk. There was no way Loki was saying what he thought he was saying. Was there?

“Uh…” 

_Eloquent, Tony._

Something changed in Loki’s expression, becoming at once much more predatory and more intimate at once. The look triggered something, niggled at those memories of last night he couldn’t access. Very abruptly he became uncertain he _wanted_ to remember the night before, not if that expression featured prominently. He wasn’t sure his heart could take it. 

Long fingers brushed his cheek. Tony jumped. He’d been so focused on Loki’s face he hadn’t even noticed his hand coming close. He hadn’t noticed how _all_ of him had been growing closer, come to that. Damn, when had the space between them gotten so narrow, and why wasn’t he backing away?

“You are an intriguing example of your species, Stark.” Loki’s fingers trailed along his hairline, not particularly intimate but at the same time _familiar,_ as though such closeness between them was a long standing fact, easy and accepted. “You interest me. Enough so I find I wish to know more of you, and that is no small feat.” His lips twitched, a hint of a smile. 

“You have caught my attention, and I tend to become very single minded upon the things which interest me.”

The fingers against his skin were warm, and conveying that warmth straight into Tony as they touched him. The thumb tracing along his jaw was a brand, a line of fire trailing behind it. 

“That’s something we have in common, then.” Wait, what was that? He hadn’t meant to say that. 

“So I noticed.”

Tony swallowed, trying hard to focus on something other than green eyes, the heat touching his face, the voice which was surprisingly soothing… anything but Loki, more or less. But it was hard when it seemed as though all of his awareness was absolutely filling with nothing _but_ Loki. 

“So… what?” He managed, proud his voice didn’t do anything more embarrassing than come out as a near whisper. “You intend to turn me into a project, now that you’ve had a free sample? Am I to believe that you intend to _seduce_ me?”

He grinned, a disconcerting expression when their faces were so close together. “Something to that effect, perhaps. I admit to being curious just how difficult it would be to accomplish when you remain sober for the experience.”

Tony’s logical mind was retreating under the onslaught. He doubted, even if he began sober with any of Loki’s seductions, that he would _remain_ so for very long. 

Logic seemed to flee entirely when his chin was abruptly gripped in strong fingers, sharpening his already captivated attention on the man before him. 

“You may be certain, _Anthony,_ that the next time we find ourselves so entangled, you _will_ remember it.”

“Next time?”

Loki only grinned at him, his green eyes sparking with mirth and promise - and he was gone. 

Tony blinked, looked around the room, but he really was gone, he and whatever other sign he might have left behind, such as his clothes. No, only Tony’s lay strewn across the floor, mostly pooled near the bed. He had no doubt that whatever magical trick he had just pulled had cleared away any and all evidence that he had ever been there, as well as himself. Tony stomped on a rising feeling of disappointment and focused instead on being relieved. 

It almost worked.

Though he found, when he examined himself in the mirror, that Loki hadn’t removed _all_ the evidence of his having been there. He would be wearing collared shirts for a while. And long sleeves down to the wrists.

**Author's Note:**

>  **Edit:** Thanks to silver_drip for a correction, where Tony's confinement in the cave was three months, not six. I appreciate it not only for this story but any future ones where the detail gets mentioned!


End file.
